Most people hear “recharge” and think it only applies to their phone.
When a busy, but extremely organized, day gets topped with layers of new challenges it can be a bit draining. Even with all challenges overcome, the sense of accomplishment is often overshadowed by a state of forced melancholy.
Nights like these are a date night… with myself. Just when I need it most, I treat myself like a king. Instead of going out to distract myself from the hole, I stay in and fill it with more of myself. It’s an oddly empowering exercise of personal fulfillment.
I’ll usually start by making an unnecessarily nice dinner while music plays in the background. Sometimes it’s grooving in my open kitchen to some down tempo electronic dance music and other times it’s Naughty by Nature’s O.P.P. with me singing all the wrong lyrics at the top of my lungs — there’s a broad range.
Regardless of my musical selection, I’m always going out of my way to prepare an artful meal. It’s not about the satisfaction of a hunger, it’s about the creation of an experience. The vegetables have to be proportionately cubed, the spices have to be expertly combined, and the cheese has to be evenly melted. Everything perfect.
I’ll usually sit down with this lovingly prepared meal and take a moment, if only a deep breath, and acknowledge myself for having done something so nice just for me.
In that blissful relaxedness I’ll watch a thought provoking movie, anything from Chasing Ice (a documentary where the film maker stalks icebergs as most photographers hunt to photograph wildlife) to Ex Machina (a science future movie where the fail of humanity is catalyzed by the birth of true artificial intelligence).
After dinner I treat myself to a wonderful morning by cleaning the dishes and kitchen while pondering the lessons and stories to be drawn from what I just watched.
I usually end up in bed shortly thereafter, and with me I have my Brainfeed Journal. This was an idea I constructed very slowly and over many years. It’s a place for any thought: creative or analytical, mine or someone else’s, poorly formed or well constructed — anything is allowed to live within this magical moleskin.
The promise was this, nothing within is allowed to be judged — only observed.
These are the nights that enable me to recharge from within. To have the ability to wake up the next day with a relaxing weekend’s worth of invigoration to lift me.
They also help me bring me to conclusions I otherwise would be unable to see…
The other day I wrote about ‘Empty Words Unsaid‘, which was challenging for me to send as it’s not only the most emotionally exposed I’ve ever been on the web it was also something that I rarely share with those the most closest to me… many of whom I tend to forget… also receive these emails.
I sent that email and completely forgot about the angst I’d had while tapping at the keys to compose it. When my good friend Roderick R. texted me to share his thoughts the following morning I had this realization:
By broadcasting to people I have never met, many whom I’ve never talked to, what I was afraid of — I was able to see how much it really mattered and… it wasn’t much.
What’s your greatest source of angst? Are you brave enough to share it?